Post by jumpcut on Jun 3, 2022 12:14:36 GMT
The Wall Street Journal's take on the state of the LPGA. Note their comment on Jin Young, highlighted below.
LPGA Tour Is Flush With Cash But Still Seeks a Superstar
www.wsj.com/articles/lpga-tour-us-open-nelly-korda-jin-young-ko-11654220279
Nelly Korda, left, and Jin Young Ko are two of the top golfers in the sport. STEVE HELBER/ASSOCIATED PRESS; YONG TECK LIM/GETTY IMAGES
The LPGA Tour has plenty to brag about at this weekend’s U.S. Women’s Open at Pine Needles in Southern Pines, N.C. A record $10 million purse is on the line, a sign of dramatically rising prize money, and sponsorship investment is way up, too.
For all the signs of growth, however, one thing is missing: a breakout star who compels casual sports fans to pay attention.
Indeed, the biggest names at Pine Needles this weekend are players on their way out of the game.
Michelle Wie West said recently she plans to withdraw from tour play after this Open, returning only for next year’s U.S. Open. Wie West, a 6-foot, long-driving, Nike-sponsored wunderkind occasionally sidelined by injuries, is now 32 years old and said her body can’t keep up anymore.
Meanwhile, bad luck has hampered the effort to build new stars. The rise of the latest U.S. hopeful—23-year-old Nelly Korda, who won a gold medal at last summer’s Tokyo Olympics—was disrupted earlier this year when she underwent surgery to remove a blood clot from her left arm. Korda told reporters at the Open she’s “just grateful to be out here.”
So while 46-year-old Tiger Woods’s latest comeback from injury fuels TV ratings for men’s golf, the LPGA tour has no players that rank among its top 20 in all-time victories still competing regularly.
“I think the tour definitely needs a star,” said sports agent Brett Falkoff, who said his client, Lexi Thompson, is a candidate to fill that role.
Thompson, who sprinkles weight-room photos among golf shots for her more than 500,000 Instagram followers, has been runner-up in two events this year. She finished just behind season scoring leader Minjee Lee in last month’s Founders Cup and is aiming for her first tour win since 2019.
Others competing at the Open include Olympic medalists, standout sisters and last year’s runaway money winner, South Korea’s Jin Young Ko. The 60 lowest scores and ties after Friday’s second round will make the cut.
Korda was ascendant last season, with four wins including the Women’s PGA Championship, before being sidelined for months early this year. She and her sister, 29-year-old Jessica Korda, are two of the most popular players on tour.
Rose Zhang, a 19-year-old Stanford golfer and the world’s top-ranked amateur, is the highest-profile upstart in the field. Zhang just became the first athlete in any sport to sign an endorsement deal with Adidas under the NCAA’s relaxed rules allowing college athletes to profit from their name, image or likeness.
Then there is Ko, the 26-year-old who already has 13 career victories–including a streak of six wins in 10 starts from last summer to early this season. Her English is deliberate, and doesn’t lend itself to the kind of video clips that might stir interest on social media.
Sorenstam, after bogeying three of her last five holes en route to a three-over-par 74 on Thursday, said via email through her husband and manager Mike McGee that the LPGA goes through cycles in terms of stars.
“I think the pipeline is full of talent and we’ll see that moving forward,” Sorenstam said, calling the LPGA a “truly global tour.”
Certainly, there’s money to be made on the LPGA Tour, where the $92 million in prize money on offer this season is up 31% from 2019. At the Open, the winner will take home $1.8 million, more than all but three players won during the entire 2021 season.
The USGA has pledged to increase the Women’s Open purse to $12 million by 2026. That’s more than double the $5.5 million the amount in 2021, when it was already the biggest purse in women’s golf. The biggest prize purse on the men’s tour is $20 million for the Players Championship.
The boost in Women’s Open prize money is being fueled by a sponsorship by Toledo, Ohio-based ProMedica, a not-for-profit health and wellness company.
“We got reponses not only from women in golf, but from people in tennis and women in industry, and women that played other sports,” said Randy Oostra, ProMedica CEO. “It became a bit of a rallying cry.”
The sponsorship is part of a wave of increased investment in women’s sports in recent years. Mollie Marcoux Samaan, the former Princeton athletic director who became LPGA commissioner last year, said the investment in women’s sports is being fueled by a range of forces, including the growth of streaming services and growing public interest in supporting historically under-resourced groups.
“People are seeing that it’s a great business decision, and it’s a good value,” she said. “But then I think the other big factor is that society’s reckoning on many things, including pay equity, [diversity, equity and inclusion] focus from these companies to say, listen, this is an opportunity to put our money where our mouth is.”
LPGA Tour Is Flush With Cash But Still Seeks a Superstar
www.wsj.com/articles/lpga-tour-us-open-nelly-korda-jin-young-ko-11654220279
Nelly Korda, left, and Jin Young Ko are two of the top golfers in the sport. STEVE HELBER/ASSOCIATED PRESS; YONG TECK LIM/GETTY IMAGES
The LPGA Tour has plenty to brag about at this weekend’s U.S. Women’s Open at Pine Needles in Southern Pines, N.C. A record $10 million purse is on the line, a sign of dramatically rising prize money, and sponsorship investment is way up, too.
For all the signs of growth, however, one thing is missing: a breakout star who compels casual sports fans to pay attention.
Indeed, the biggest names at Pine Needles this weekend are players on their way out of the game.
Michelle Wie West said recently she plans to withdraw from tour play after this Open, returning only for next year’s U.S. Open. Wie West, a 6-foot, long-driving, Nike-sponsored wunderkind occasionally sidelined by injuries, is now 32 years old and said her body can’t keep up anymore.
Meanwhile, bad luck has hampered the effort to build new stars. The rise of the latest U.S. hopeful—23-year-old Nelly Korda, who won a gold medal at last summer’s Tokyo Olympics—was disrupted earlier this year when she underwent surgery to remove a blood clot from her left arm. Korda told reporters at the Open she’s “just grateful to be out here.”
So while 46-year-old Tiger Woods’s latest comeback from injury fuels TV ratings for men’s golf, the LPGA tour has no players that rank among its top 20 in all-time victories still competing regularly.
“I think the tour definitely needs a star,” said sports agent Brett Falkoff, who said his client, Lexi Thompson, is a candidate to fill that role.
Thompson, who sprinkles weight-room photos among golf shots for her more than 500,000 Instagram followers, has been runner-up in two events this year. She finished just behind season scoring leader Minjee Lee in last month’s Founders Cup and is aiming for her first tour win since 2019.
Others competing at the Open include Olympic medalists, standout sisters and last year’s runaway money winner, South Korea’s Jin Young Ko. The 60 lowest scores and ties after Friday’s second round will make the cut.
Korda was ascendant last season, with four wins including the Women’s PGA Championship, before being sidelined for months early this year. She and her sister, 29-year-old Jessica Korda, are two of the most popular players on tour.
Rose Zhang, a 19-year-old Stanford golfer and the world’s top-ranked amateur, is the highest-profile upstart in the field. Zhang just became the first athlete in any sport to sign an endorsement deal with Adidas under the NCAA’s relaxed rules allowing college athletes to profit from their name, image or likeness.
Then there is Ko, the 26-year-old who already has 13 career victories–including a streak of six wins in 10 starts from last summer to early this season. Her English is deliberate, and doesn’t lend itself to the kind of video clips that might stir interest on social media.
Sorenstam, after bogeying three of her last five holes en route to a three-over-par 74 on Thursday, said via email through her husband and manager Mike McGee that the LPGA goes through cycles in terms of stars.
“I think the pipeline is full of talent and we’ll see that moving forward,” Sorenstam said, calling the LPGA a “truly global tour.”
Certainly, there’s money to be made on the LPGA Tour, where the $92 million in prize money on offer this season is up 31% from 2019. At the Open, the winner will take home $1.8 million, more than all but three players won during the entire 2021 season.
The USGA has pledged to increase the Women’s Open purse to $12 million by 2026. That’s more than double the $5.5 million the amount in 2021, when it was already the biggest purse in women’s golf. The biggest prize purse on the men’s tour is $20 million for the Players Championship.
The boost in Women’s Open prize money is being fueled by a sponsorship by Toledo, Ohio-based ProMedica, a not-for-profit health and wellness company.
“We got reponses not only from women in golf, but from people in tennis and women in industry, and women that played other sports,” said Randy Oostra, ProMedica CEO. “It became a bit of a rallying cry.”
The sponsorship is part of a wave of increased investment in women’s sports in recent years. Mollie Marcoux Samaan, the former Princeton athletic director who became LPGA commissioner last year, said the investment in women’s sports is being fueled by a range of forces, including the growth of streaming services and growing public interest in supporting historically under-resourced groups.
“People are seeing that it’s a great business decision, and it’s a good value,” she said. “But then I think the other big factor is that society’s reckoning on many things, including pay equity, [diversity, equity and inclusion] focus from these companies to say, listen, this is an opportunity to put our money where our mouth is.”
